SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 
of suitable grants to individuals, or the generous support of Universities 
sand other independent institutions for research, to encourage the pursuit 
‘of research in pure science, it was dangerous and even fatal to attempt 
to organize it. Research of this nature has no other aim than the 
creation of new knowledge, and is impatient of the control which is 
inseparable from the idea of external organization. On the other hand, 
‘however, the Council asserted that “it is necessary for the modern 
‘State to organize research, which we may call investigation into problems 
which directly affect the well-being of large sections of its people.” 
In the concluding pages of the report the new activities of other 
European countries are broadly surveyed, and it appears that the appli- 
cation of science to industry is to be backed by Government funds in 
both France and Italy, and that research is to occupy a more important 
and exalted place than in pre-war days. Liberally endowed as science 
has been in the United States in the past, it is to be even more generously 
treated in the future, and a keener and closer interest is to be taken 
by the Government in the allocation of grants and in the trend of 
research. 
Further information upon the aims and intentions of the British 
Government in regard to the scientific investigations into trade problems 
was afforded by the despatch of Lord Milner, a copy of which has already 
been published in this journal. The war brought home to British 
manufacturers and to the British public, with almost painful clearness, 
how her original supremacy as an industrial nation was threatened. The 
scheme of reconstruction envisages and embraces the whole of the 
Empire. But Great Britain’s efforts must necessarily be directed 
primarily to her own salvation, and the protectorates and dependencies - 
are asked to review their activities in scientific research and economic 
eXploration, “and for consideration of all promising schemes, either 
for new work of this description or for adding to the efficiency or 
widening the scope of work already in progress.” 
Important as these movements are, however, they only foreshadow 
far greater developments. There is an insistent demand by the great 
thinkers in Great Britain that there shall be a colossal magnification of 
the scientific system of research and organization. Reports of the 
recent conference of the British Association for the Advancement of 
Science abound with allusions to the necessity of widening the scope of 
and multiplying the facilities for research. The establishment of the 
Department of Scientific and Industrial Research is everywhere warmly 
welcomed, but it is regarded as the first instalment and not as the final 
contribution of the State towards the further advancement of British 
industry. 
E.N.R. 
